The economic development in the High North requires good transport solutions across national borders. Experts from the four countries have now started studying transport challenges and cross-border transport routes on roads, railway, sea and air transport.

National transport plans, strategic studies and bilateral studies have identified a need for a more integrated approach to the transport system across borders in the Barents region. A joint plan is a natural step to follow up the different studies and plans. The expert group will come up with a suggestion to a joint transport plan for long-term development of the infrastructure in the Barents Region.

The international expert group Joint Barents Transport Plan is led by Torbjørn Naimak, Head of Norwegian Public Roads Administration’s Northern Region. “We have now started work in the international group and are on a tight schedule. All the countries have their mind set on doing a good job”, Naimak says in a press release.

The group will formulate general strategies on how an effective, sustainable and robust transport system should be developed. They will pinpoint bottle necks and barriers for border crossing transport, both on technical and administrative nature and point out the main directions for development of infrastructure on the basis of predicted transport volumes in the border crossing Corridors.

A declaration will be presented for the transport ministers to sign, based on advice from the expert group.

The company is closing down its biggest mine in the Kola Peninsula following plummeting raw material prices. Consequences will be dramatic for Zapolyarny, the industrial town located along the border to Norway.